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| [May 02, 2010, 4:48 pm ET] - Share - Viewing Comments |
The SEGA America Blog has details on how Digital Rights Management will work for the upcoming PC edition of Alpha Protocol, Obsidian Entertainment's espionage-themed action/RPG. The post includes a full FAQ on the topic of their DRM, and here's the summary: The system chosen for Alpha Protocol is Uniloc: SoftAnchor. The system will allow the user to activate Alpha Protocol online immediately out of the box and once activated the user never needs to worry about activating again. The activation can be used on a limited amount of PCs, and can be deactivated through our online servers allowing the user full control over their license – should they need to re-install, swap machines or suffer a catastrophic hardware failure on their normal PC.
In the future, SEGA will be releasing an unprotected patch of the game to alleviate any fears of not being able to play the game when the Uniloc servers won’t be around anymore.
We also do not use Steamworks – the Steam released version will use Uniloc DRM.
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| 61. |
Re: Alpha Protocol DRM Details |
May 7, 2010, 00:55 |
JD |
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Verno wrote on May 6, 2010, 21:45:
Saying something is true isn't the same as it being true. On that we agree because that statement certainly applies to your posts.
Your continued insults and worthless snide remarks are wasted on me That's not the only thing which has obviously been wasted on you. An education and the truth are two others.
Uh, it's pretty obvious we all knew what you meant. Except that "we" obviously didn't include you because you missed my point with your reply. You only tried to manufacture an argument from it either because you didn't read what I wrote or because you were simply trolling.
Publishers often say one thing and do another. SEGA didn't say anything here about this which I why I posted my observation on it in the first place. SEGA made the change in DRM for a reason, and it is most likely for the two reasons I gave. End of story.
You seem to want to separate consumer buying from the distribution when they are obviously entwined. One can only assume it's because it does not suit your argument because there is literally no other good reason. And again your entire argument sits on the precarious notion of a Sega PR statement and really, what publisher doesn't invalid claims about DRM? And as for PC gamers buying from retail, not Steam, they're all getting Uniloc regardless which is really the whole point of why we're discussing this in the first place. Wow, there you go again. You start with a false premise of my position, and then you just take off on a tangent from there. You don't need to divine or assume what my position is. You simply need to read it below in black and white and cogitate on it while you do.
Below I simply cited the retail sales of CODMW2 as a recent example of a game with this type of DRM which was not shunned by PC game consumers. It's certainly not the only example of such a game, but it is a prominent one. The only reason I brought up the issue of Steam was to head off a rebuttal that Steam's DRM doesn't count or that Steam was the reason for this acceptance since some people like Steam for its distribution features. So, I pointed out that those features aren't relevant in this case because these retail buyers didn't acquire the game though Steam and these benefits aren't unique to Steam or relevant to them. It was the game itself that made the DRM accepted by retail buyers.
Steam itself is the DRM for all meaningful intents and purposes. Steam's actual DRM is nothing more than a simple executable wrapper that is easily defeated. You are wrong on both counts. Valve has evolved Steam's DRM quite a bit over the last couple of years to the point where there are multiple options to the specific application of the DRM (although the absence of DRM still isn't one of those options).
Publishers do not approach Steam for simple product protection Yes, some do. 2K used Steam purely for DRM in NBA2K9 as the game isn't even sold on Steam at all. Warner Bros used Steam as the exclusive DRM for FEAR 2 for retail copies of the game (with Gamespy providing the multiplayer support and leaderboards) although the game was also distributed through Steam as well.
Name one Steamworks title that is not also distributed through Steam. I just did.
Regardless, people who want resale purchase at retail regardless because resale on digital distribution services is dead and quite frankly was never really alive in the first place. First, it's not just about resale. Sharing and giving away games are also quite desirable amongst most game consumers. In the old days with computer games that came on physical media, it was common, relatively easy, and even permissable in many cases to share a single copy of a game amongst friends and family members especially for multiplayer use. Steam and similar types of restrictive DRM have robbed PC gamers of that ability. Resale, sharing, and transferring is only dead at digital distributors like Steam because its policies forbid these things and its DRM enforces that. At Direct2Drive where its games primarily use Internet activation-based DRM with some DRM-free titles, it is still possible to share and pass along a copy of a game so long as available activations for the game remain. This is because a game's DRM is separate from its actual distribution and unlike Steam all of a customer's games aren't tied together with the same DRM lock so if you lose access to one game, you lose access to them all.
You claim consumers have accepted internet activation DRM, I don't really buy that. I think consumers have accepted Steam. No, it's not just Steam because there have been plenty of AAA game titles which have used activation-based DRM which is not Steam's. Bioshock is one example. Mass Effect is another. GTA IV is yet another. Burnout Paradise, Crysis, Mirror's Edge, Dead Space, MySims, NHL 09, Ghostbusters, and Sacred 2 are some others. While a vocal minority has paid some public lipservice to railing against such DRM, it apparently hasn't negatively affected sales in any significant way because this DRM continues to be used. SEGA's Uniloc will be the latest example although on paper it is much more lenient and flexible than some of these others.
Uniloc DRM and other internet based activation methods that use hardware hashes can't make that same claim. A hardware hash is not what makes a DRM restrictive. Steam uses a similar hash for its offline mode to keep people from being able to play a transferred game on a PC on which it was not activated/authorized. What makes a DRM restrictive are the actual limits that are placed on the use of a game. That is where Steam is too restrictive and where SEGA's use of Uniloc is more lenient.
Even a casual market title like Spore was met with serious press problems related to its hardware hash based DRM. And yet the game is still for sale with this DRM.
I don't see how you can reasonably make this claim when any other DRM can and has had the same effect on the consumer. No, that is exactly the point of the statement. Steam's DRM is every bit as much a lock as other DRM if not more so. Steam's benefits as a digital distributor don't negate its DRM because they don't allow the game to be played if the DRM prevents it. The benefits are worthless in that eventuality.
Steam is an acceptable compromise. Steam isn't a compromise because it doesn't compromise on the DRM at all. In some ways Steam is more restrictive than any other DRM in use today because it is a single kill switch to all games which use it regardless of who made them or when they were purchased. Steam as a distribution service does offers some convenience benefits which relate to acquiring and maintaining games. However these aren't related to or necessitated by the DRM. And those benefits completely disappear if the DRM is enforced along with the ability to play the game. If you lose your Steam account, not only can you no longer download or update any of your games, but you can't play any of them either. That's not a compromise. What is being compromised there is the right of the customer to play the games for which he paid.
I doubt many people really think they're signing up and buying games on Steam so that they can have unlimited simultaneous logins and to share the games with their friends. Given that the subject is addressed in the frequently-asked questions section of Steam's support website, it is obvious that many if not most people want to be able to do those things even though Steam doesn't allow them.
This comment was edited on May 7, 2010, 02:57. |
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